Politics: A new beginning

[ltl/fb]

Originally posted by Say_hello_for_me
My point: You have rephrased every statement I've written on the subject so that you can attack the "point" you say I'm trying to make.

More famous people here -- who woulda thought Rumsfeld would have time to post on our humble board.

[notcasesensitive]

So where do you all weigh in on the govt stepping in and telling this guy that he is not allowed to have his wife's feeding tube removed?

story: http://www.cnn.com/2003/LAW/10/21/coma.woman/index.html

[Say_hello_for_me]

Originally posted by Tyrone_Slothrop
OK, let's pretend this is just about contractual rights. If so, you don't need a Do Not Call Registry. But the reason we have a Do Not Call Registry is that contracts are failing us, in at least two ways. (1) Before we have the chance to decline the telemarketer's contractual offer to us, we have already been annoyed during dinner. (2) The phone companies have not offered us an option of contracting out of such calls. (Maybe this is because of government regulation; I don't know.)

See my later response(s) re: regulated natural monopolies. In short, I think the better answer would be to change the ways the phone companies are regulated (slightly).

Same outcome, less direct executive-branch enforcement, more judicial branch.

Hello

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by rufus leeking
I ask: what if an al Queda guy gets caught trying to smuggle them on, and says, "just testing"

Holy shit, you're right! If we don't throw the book at this college student, chief, we'd have to let the Al Qaida guy go too! Good thing you pointed that out -- we surely averted a major catatrophe.

[Hank Chinaski]

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmp..._mahathir_dc_9
spree Malay guy repeats anti-jew arguments- *

No word on whether his Mosque shares space with Synagouge, but absent something like that, he seems fixed in his views.


sniped from a post on infirm- not mine

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by Say_hello_for_me
See my later response(s) re: regulated natural monopolies. In short, I think the better answer would be to change the ways the phone companies are regulated (slightly).

Same outcome, less direct executive-branch enforcement, more judicial branch.

Hello

It's an interesting idea, but I don't see how it plays out. What's the contract between you and the phone company going to say? Does the phone company have a choice to leave things the way they are? If not, surely it's just as constitutionally difficult.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by Hank Chinaski
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmp..._mahathir_dc_9
spree Malay guy repeats anti-jew arguments- *

No word on whether his Mosque shares space with Synagouge, but absent something like that, he seems fixed in his views.


sniped from a post on infirm- not mine

Paul Krugman in today's NYT has the best explanation I've seen of why Mahathir (sp?) is making these statements: It's a sop to his country's Muslim majority, but one which does not inflame tensions with the ethnic Chinese minority, which is very important economically.

[Say_hello_for_me]

Originally posted by notcasesensitive
So where do you all weigh in on the govt stepping in and telling this guy that he is not allowed to have his wife's feeding tube removed?

story: http://www.cnn.com/2003/LAW/10/21/coma.woman/index.html

Yo, like I said this weekend, the picture of Mrs. Schiavo sitting up in bed looking into her moms eyes (maybe 4 or 5 years ago), made me want to cry.

There are several issues though:

Parents or spouse, who decides?

Why is it okay to starve a human being to death?

Regardless of the answer to the immediately prior question, why is it okay to starve a human being to death if they are in a vegative state, and where there is no allegation that such state includes a great deal of pain?

I will stay out of this one though. All I'm saying is that I wouldn't want to be second guessing the parents or the spouse for something like this.

Hello

[rufus leeking]

Originally posted by Tyrone_Slothrop
Holy shit, you're right! If we don't throw the book at this college student, chief, we'd have to let the Al Qaida guy go too! Good thing you pointed that out -- we surely averted a major catatrophe.

exactly! the white guy we can let go. we know he's only goofing. I remember a case from Crim Law that said a law which defines illegality based upon whether the cop thinks the behavior is wrong is unconstitutional. something about wearing the flag in a disrespectful manner, a cop would decide disrespectful etc...
so here the security guy would know the college kid, he is doing a well intentioned test. the al Queda guy, well he is doing bad.

but, isn't that, um, unconstitutional.

[Say_hello_for_me]

Originally posted by Tyrone_Slothrop
It's an interesting idea, but I don't see how it plays out. What's the contract between you and the phone company going to say? Does the phone company have a choice to leave things the way they are? If not, surely it's just as constitutionally difficult.

THe government just changes the regulation to say the phone companies "can" offer this service.

If the phone companies have to route calls for their competitors, it shouldn't be any skin off their backs to do something as simple as offer their customers a (basic) choice. Tell ya the truth, I'd be comfortable with any choice. Ex. nobody except those on a list that I provide, or with an access code I give out, can get my phone to ring. I won't say how I know, but I do know, these things are not all that hard to implement in the system.

These things are out there already. Problem is, they are sort of expensive.

But if you allow phone companies to offer a whole range of such services, for example, for example no callers of class X, no "commercial" callers (and the phone company has already categorized residential and commercial numbers), no callers whatsoever after 10:00 PM... you get the picture. If this stuff was enabled by regulation, the telephone companies would provide the options.

Once you have the options, its the phone companies fault if things get screwed up. Nobody gets fined. Nobody gets fired. The phone company just "adjusts" the numbers for so-and-so, in response to complaints.

It really shouldn't be a problem.

Hello

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by rufus leeking
exactly! the white guy we can let go. we know he's only goofing. I remember a case from Crim Law that said a law which defines illegality based upon whether the cop thinks the behavior is wrong is unconstitutional. something about wearing the flag in a disrespectful manner, a cop would decide disrespectful etc...
so here the security guy would know the college kid, he is doing a well intentioned test. the al Queda guy, well he is doing bad.

but, isn't that, um, unconstitutional.

It's like that after-school special where Bobby gets in trouble for leaving the door to the house open, only he did it because he was trying to get the dog back in, but his mother didn't know that. So he got a spanking even though he was trying to do the right thing. 'Cause rules are rules.

And that's why Rush is going to jail.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by Say_hello_for_me
THe government just changes the regulation to say the phone companies "can" offer this service.

If the phone companies have to route calls for their competitors, it shouldn't be any skin off their backs to do something as simple as offer their customers a (basic) choice. Tell ya the truth, I'd be comfortable with any choice. Ex. nobody except those on a list that I provide, or with an access code I give out, can get my phone to ring. I won't say how I know, but I do know, these things are not all that hard to implement in the system.

These things are out there already. Problem is, they are sort of expensive.

But if you allow phone companies to offer a whole range of such services, for example, for example no callers of class X, no "commercial" callers (and the phone company has already categorized residential and commercial numbers), no callers whatsoever after 10:00 PM... you get the picture. If this stuff was enabled by regulation, the telephone companies would provide the options.

Once you have the options, its the phone companies fault if things get screwed up. Nobody gets fined. Nobody gets fired. The phone company just "adjusts" the numbers for so-and-so, in response to complaints.

It really shouldn't be a problem.

Hello

How does the phone company know whether a call is coming from a telemarketer?

[Say_hello_for_me]

Originally posted by Tyrone_Slothrop
How does the phone company know whether a call is coming from a telemarketer?

You mean, aside from the 300 phones that are in constant outgoing use?

Hello

[ms. naughty diplomat]

Originally posted by Say_hello_for_me
Same outcome, less direct executive-branch enforcement, more judicial branch.

so under your plan would consumers complain to the judiciary or the executive branch about all of those highly annoying 1-800-collect and 10-10-220, etc. commercials. i think that any new regulations of the telephone industry should prevent those ads if they expect to be successful.

[rufus leeking]

Originally posted by Tyrone_Slothrop
It's like that after-school special where Bobby gets in trouble for leaving the door to the house open, only he did it because he was trying to get the dog back in, but his mother didn't know that. So he got a spanking even though he was trying to do the right thing. 'Cause rules are rules.

better than your version, like the Strangers With Candy, where Gerri was fixing to fuck this kid, but then she found out he was her son so she didn't.

And that's why Rush is going to jail.

wait. I hadn't read the stories about this earnest young man. I take it he is a democrat, and so my wanting him tossed shows how hypocritical it is that some prosecutor in Fla......um, I'm lost here. This a problem with being a cartoonish nuisance sock.